Artificial Neuron Snaps a Venus Flytrap Shut

Trouble viewing? View in your browser. View all Scientific American publications.

    

March 01, 2022

Dear Reader, Researchers have triggered a Venus flytrap to snap shut by controlling it with an artificial neuron. The carnivorous plant acts as a testing ground for the technology, which could one day act as an interface between the human body and a prosthetic limb.

Sophie Bushwick, Associate Editor, Technology

Biotech Artificial Neuron Snaps a Venus Flytrap Shut Researchers say that such bio-integrated systems could be the future of prosthetics By Joanna Thompson

Defense Russia-Ukraine Conflict Prompted U.S. to Develop Autonomous Drone Swarms, 1,000-Mile Cannon The U.S. military has new technology on the drawing board in response to warfare trends previously demonstrated in the region By Jason Sherman

Computing The Staggering Ecological Impacts of Computation and the Cloud The cloud is not only material but also an ecological force By Steven Gonzalez Monserrate,The MIT Press Reader

Medicine Messenger RNA Therapies Are Finally Fulfilling Their Promise Instructing our cells to make specific proteins could control influenza, autoimmune diseases, even cancer By Drew Weissman

Engineering The Culture of Engineering Overlooks the People It's Supposed to Serve We must start teaching undergraduates to think about those for whom they design By Grace Wickerson

Computing The Metaverse Is Coming: We May Already Be in It As in the world of The Matrix, we may not be able to tell what's real and what's not By Rizwan Virk

Space Exploration Russia's Invasion of Ukraine Strains International Space Station Partnership Life onboard the ISS goes on in the wake of Russia's attack against Ukraine, even as the space project faces an uncertain future By Joanna Thompson

Space Exploration COVID Disrupted Everything--Even Rocket Launches Surprising supply chain breakdowns By Tory Bruno

Space Exploration China Plans Asteroid Missions, Space Telescopes and a Moon Base In the next five years, the nation hopes to launch a robotic craft to an asteroid, two lunar missions and an orbital observatory By Elizabeth Gibney,Nature magazine

FROM THE STORE Revolutions in Science Normally science proceeds in incremental steps, but sometimes a discovery is so profound that it causes a paradigm shift. This eBook is a collection of articles about those kinds of advances, including revolutionary discoveries about the origin of life, theories of learning, formation of the solar system and more.

QUOTE OF THE DAY "One of the operations, a propaganda campaign featuring a website pushing anti-Ukraine talking points, was an offshoot of a known Russian disinformation operation. A Facebook spokesperson said it used computer-generated faces to bolster the credibility of fake columnists across several platforms, including Instagram." Ben Collins and Jo Ling Kent, NBC News

ADVERTISEMENT

FROM THE ARCHIVE Light-Powered Computers Brighten AI's Future Optical computers may have finally found a use—improving artificial intelligence By Jesse Dunietz | June 2017

LATEST ISSUES

Questions?   Comments?

Download the Scientific American App

To view this email as a web page, go here. You received this email because you opted-in to receive email from Scientific American. To ensure delivery please add news@email.scientificamerican.com to your address book. Unsubscribe     Manage Email Preferences     Privacy Policy     Contact Us